Mavromati to Bassae to Mount Taygetos
My holiday journal from 2007 (originally posted to MySpace on June 11th, 2007)
May 11th, 2007: Mavromati – Bassae - Mt. Taygetos
When you drive, you see a lot of the back of your hands. I can see how swollen the sprained right thumb is. I can see neither the two tendons that run to it, not the one for my forefinger – it's all a taut, shapeless bulge.
As I drove I became aware of an ache in my upper back; below, but close to, my left shoulder blade. I decide I'll have to have a look when I get to my next stop and have access to a mirror.
I awoke early – 7 am or so. Sleep had been a bit fitful – turning over is no longer spontaneous but, instead, calls for a lot of preparatory shuffling and weight shifting, using bits of my anatomy that aren't scuffed or sprained or tender.
I read in bed until 8am or so, then got up and went to the shop to buy some yoghurt and juice for breakfast: I will eat the banana with the yoghurt and save the apple for lunch. (It is a big apple). Once I'd done my ablutions and a bit of first aid, I went to settle up and go to the museum and site.
The museum did not exist six years ago – but is small, elegant and well labelled. I was most impressed. It is clear from this, and the continuing work at the site, that funds are available and Messini is being developed for visitors. I am ambivalent about that – it is clearly much more accessible to visitors, of whom there will be more, and the buildings and artefacts themselves will be conserved and restored to a limited extent. What is lost is the sense of discovery and freedom that was so evident when I was last here with Jason. I had a nude picture taken on the archon's seat in the stadium – no chance of that now!
The site is well conserved, and work continues to uncover more. There were lots of groundskeepers and builders and the like, and an exuberant group of teenagers from Kalamata Grammar School, who were keen to say hello, discover where I was from and practice their English and be in photos.
Wild flowers abounded as usual and there were lizards who were less fleet of foot than their colleagues in Delphi – or was it the early hour? Doubtful – it was well in the 30s C by 10am.
There were startlingly fierce wasps of alarming size – red with two yellow bands to warn. The usual blue bees drifted clumsily about and lots of butterflies – mauves, blues, reds, whites and yellows dancing past.
I looked at Arsinoe's fountain (mum to Asklepios, who sanctuary was the focal point of worship in Messini). It is fed from the Klepsydra spring, which runs yet in the modern village and from which you can fill your water bottles. The water then courses through the ancient city, visible here and there, before making a cooling appearance in the gymnasium complex. The city centre is a planned build, as indeed is the whole city.
For centuries the Messenians were Spartan helots (slaves), brutally subjugated. They rose in revolt but were crushed. With the decline in Spartan power after the Peloponnesian War (they beat the Athenians after a 40 year slog but exhausted themselves in the process), the Thebans under Epaminondas (3rd C BCE) stepped into the breach – defeating the Spartans at Leuctra and ensuring the newly liberated Messenians would maintain their independence in a purpose built, democratically planned, fortress city. The walls at Messini are 9km in circuit and lots of sections still stand proud. The most impressive sections are at the Lakonian Gate, which you still drive through to reach Mavromati.
Around the agora, the Temple of Asklepios, the Sanctuary of Artemis, the council chamber and agora are compact and delightful in design and execution. Little gems.
The city itself is built on gently sloping ground: as it falls away, a gymnasium complex and stadium carry the eye into the valley stretched out below: vineyards, olive groves – as there have always been. The stadium is much restored – the seating is cleared, levelled and sections beyond the retaining wall, landscaped.
The Heroon, inaccessible 6 years ago, is pristine and impressive, as it was intended to be. A real statement of local power and political supremacy by the prominent local family who had supplied Rome with a Consul in the 2nd C
The section of wall and the tower nearby have great resonance for me. If I call the tower the BJ tower you will grasp why. Had I two reliable thumbs, I might have climbed up again and seen what the view was like 6 years on. The memory of that afternoon caused a stir in the loins. Interesting. Not that the Jason is an unlikely object of sexual desire – he was then, and is still (I am sure) a definite hottie. At least, so I found him. But the most profound connection was not sexual and the fracture caused by the manner of the break up was so traumatic that I doubted my capacity to manage it. It has taken years for me to begin to get a grip on that relationship and make some (fragmentary) sense of it. What surprised me was not the sexual passion that stirred but that, given the gall and wormwood associated with J, that the fire was not immediately extinguished.
Scampering about, I took a few photographs and then set off on the long mountain drive to Bassae, and the Temple of Epicurean Apollo there. Designed by Ictinus (Parthenon fame), it is presently undergoing long term conservation work and is protected by a big tent. I am not sure what I will see – there was little 6 years ago, but the drive is superb.
From my digs, I had a panoramic of Mavromati... the village lay to the left, the ancient site below, among cypresses, an in the far distance - the plain leading to Kalmata. So, I swung out on the day’s drive.
There were no tunes on this drive – just birdsong, the slick of the tyres, the changing note of the engine and the dolorous tink-tonk of goats' bells. The scenery was wild and rugged – with gorse enlivening the hillsides and verges all around. The Fingers of God pointed to a blue sky. The slopes were bursting with yellow gorse as I climbed towards Bassae,
As I rounded one bend, some 10km from the temple, I heard a snatch of conversation J and I had had that summer in 2001. There are evident signs of terraces as you slow to navigate the hairpin – and we spoke of those ancient farmers and the work involved in levelling, wall-building, and conserving the e precious soil – safeguarding your olive trees in an unforgiving landscape.
There were glorious flowers at Bassae - a meadow carpet and hardy alpines clinging to crevices. And beehives.
From the Temple it was another run to the south – on a different road this time, to take me to the busier thoroughfares that lead to Kalamata
The town will be familiar to any Greek olive enthusiasts. It was a lush drive, and it took me past Figaleia – another J stop off from the past. This time there was an old German at the spring – asking me directions to Platania.
There was no sign of the ancient and massive land crab who inhabited the old spring house, nor the little scamperers who were the up and coming residents. I gave the German – who could be me in 20 years (travelling alone, doughty, and well set up for a picnic) – some directions in my best German and set off again.
From Figaleia, a slow descent before crossing the Taygetos range.
I want to take the road over Mt Taygetos – the great chain that separates Messenia from Lacedaemon (ancient Sparta). I intend to stop in a guest house at the top of the Langhada Pass – and have an easy run into Sparta tomorrow. The drive was another stunner. It is easy to see why ancient Sparta was never fortified – unlike most Greek cities. The mountains, and the Spartan army - was defence enough.
I approached Mt Taygetos from the west and then climbed the ridge - on a spectacular road, arriving at the guest house – a little like an Alpine chalet, really, at a little after 6pm. So I can have a leisurely evening. A brew, a quiet read for a while, then a shower and first aid session. I checked my back – the source of the pain is evident – three serried red weals that relate to vertebrae that were skittered on as I made that clumsy forward roll. Both they, the knee, and the arm are beginning to show big, nasty looking bruises, as well as the black-scabbed craters that mark skin loss. The right hand's wounds look clean but the skin loss is so great they will be days acquiring a protective scab. More dressings for now…
[ NOTE: I had fallen whilst racing in the stadium at Delphi the day before - against non-one - just running full pelt for the finish line. I fell on a patch of uneven ground - a depression meant I was thrown off-balance and my trailing foot could not catch up: I nose dived into the gravel and earth at 20+ mph. To save my face I extended my right hand and then rolled onto my left shoulder. This was the cause of the injuries. I learned subsequently that I’d broken two bones in my right hand as I used it to protect my face].
OK. Enough of the health update: time for ouzo, a photo edit, then off to find some food. It's just turned 8.30pm here.
Today was brought to you by the colours yellow,
and by the fragrances of gorse,
Well, now, high up in the pass, it's all pine resin!
Staying at the top of the mountain, I had to drive 12km down it to find a place to eat – a recommended taverna in Tripi. It was very busy – with people arriving until well after 11pm – I left at 11.30pm. The customers ranged from little kids to grandparents – often in family groups – with the kids circulating and burrowing out anything that interested them. Me, of course – alone, with a book and his food. It was a good spot – food was as good as suggested and the atmosphere warm and friendly. The two waiters were identical twins – mid 20s at a guess, and absolutely indistinguishable. Much more so than the 'identical' twins in our family – who already look very different as teenagers. The owner of the taverna took a great delight in me and my limited but brave Greek. When it was time to pay, he would not let me include the coffee I had taken to conclude the meal – and insisted on giving me a dessert, to boot, before I left. But this I find with the Greeks, as a people: they consistently welcome and celebrate visitors – when they make a demonstrable effort to pay a modicum of respect the country they visit by learning at least something of the language.
The drive backup the mountain hairpins was a 20 minute thrill. Once home, I went out on to the balcony to look at the night sky. It presented a panoramic view of unearthly beauty. Diamonds on black velvet.
I had not seen such a sky since I was last on Rum, one of the islands off the west of Scotland. The reason was the same: no light pollution.
We have raised a generation of children who never see the night sky, still less are entranced by its constellations and the myths they speak of. There are some 6000 stars in the night sky – few of us town and city dwellers ever see more than a few hundred.
And so to bed – midnight…
